Kearneysville M.E.-Boyd Carter Memorial Legal Fund

With the industrialization of Jefferson County and the installation of a gas pipeline, sacred places like the Kearneysville Methodist/Boyd Carter Memorial Cemetery are under threat. With a pipeline map showing the gas line hugging two of the cemetery’s borders and property markers placed within the cemetery, a volunteer effort began to protect/preserve this burial ground and get new trustees in place. 

 

After two years of fighting to protect their families’ finally resting place, the trustees have accrued significant legal fees. With their persistence, there was acknowledgement that the surveyed boundaries did not match the perceived boundaries when burials first occurred more than 100 years ago. There was an adjustment to an emergency access road and a fence has also been erected.  

The trustees and descendants of those interred in the cemetery appreciate your support. 

Background: 

The Kearneysville Methodist Cemetery was officially established in 1902. The land was deeded to the trustees by the Standard Lime & Stone Quarry president, Daniel Baker. The original deed for the cemetery states “the said lot of ground conveyed to the aforesaid Trustees [is] to be used as a burying ground for colored people and no other purpose (DB 98, 68).” Many early burials were those of individuals associated with the Stewart Chapel African Methodist Episcopal Church (JF-0078-0058), established in 1889, which was located a short distance from the cemetery. 

The land where the cemetery is located was originally part of the Dandridge plantation--which at one time had one of the largest slave holdings in what is now Jefferson County. According to local historians, the area was likely a burial ground for slaves before it was officially deeded as an African American cemetery.  Over the years, burials occurred beyond the surveyed boundaries; a conveyance for the land around the original cemetery was recorded in 1963 and unofficially named Boyd Carter Memorial (DB 264, 149). According to death certificates, burial records, and remaining visible grave markers, there are nearly 200 burials. The graves in the cemetery are marked with standard headstones, handmade headstones, field stones, metal markers, and plantings such as yucca, lilies, daffodils and rose bushes.